What is it about stickers?

Why is it that all you have to do is give a kid a pack of stickers, and they go to town like this?!?! I feel like this is a universal phenomonon with kids. They automatically stick them ALL over their bodies.

After coating her arm with stickers, she moved on to her face. These stickers are Nemo stickers since she is currently on a HUGE Nemo and Bolt fix. They are her favorite characters right now...until maybe next week when she might discover something else that is more fun.

Such is the glorious life of a 2 year old!!!

Girls day out

Yesterday I was able to have a girls day out, and it was FANTASTIC!!!! Kelly, Crystal, and I went shopping at an outlet mall near Austin and had a blast. It was great to get out of the house with no kids for a whole day. We ate lunch and dinner out and we were actually able to leisurely eat 2 meals, which is not common around here. We spent about 3 hours at the outlets and found some great deals. Although, here is my one beef for the day. There are all kinds of adorable girls clothes in kids shops, but only the boys clothes were on super sales. Crystal got some great deals on clothes for Joe, and I did too, but not nearly like what the sales were for boys clothes. What is the deal with that?!?!

We tried on ridiculous shoes, just because we could. Sorry if you actually own these shoes...but I think they are ridiculous looking!

And, we ate the most amazing dinner! We ate at BJ's restaurant and brewhouse in Temple, which was AMAZING!!!!!!! We got a Mediterranean pizza which was, by far, the best pizza I have ever tasted. It was a deep dish pizza with basil garlic sauce, chicken, feta cheese, kalamata olives, and banana peppers. It was like a Greek salad on pizza....WOW is all I have to say. And the pizzoki for dessert was a huge cookie shaped like a pizza with ice cream! It was beyond amazing and a great way to end the night.

Thanks Kelly and Crystal for an amazing girls day out! You two are awesome!

Just some backseat singing from our "Chatty Kathy."

For those of you that know Jason well, you might notice that she talks with her hands JUST like Jason does. He says that this delights his heart!

We took Jason to Outback tonight for his Father's Day dinner. It was great! Hannah also picked out the shirt that Jason is wearing last week. While we were shopping I walked through the clothes section and told Hannah that we should pick out a shirt for Daddy. This was the first one she grabbed and it was even the right size. Jason loved it and wore it all day today. How cute are these two together?!?!

Here is Hannah's wish for all the Daddy's out there this Father's Day.

Father's Day

Happy Father's Day to my wonderful husband who is an absolutely incredible dad!!!! I will post pictures later of our day today.
Happy Father's Day to my awesome dad as well! I love you so much Dad and I am SO thankful for you! It is a true blessing to call you my dad!!!

And, Happy Father's Day to all the other wonderful dads out there too!

UP

Here are the pictures from when we say UP this week.

She was already enthralled by the previews (and the bucket of popcorn!).

Fun times with good friends!

Joe is getting to be so big! He will be 2 in Oct and I can hardly believe it.

See the post below about our last few days.

We love summer

We have had a fun filled last few days with all kinds of new things for Hannah.

On Tuesday Kelly, Hannah, and I went for a walk around Baylor's campus at 3 in the afternoon. Now, if you don't live anywhere near TX in the summer, you have no idea how silly this was of us. It was about 102 degrees (seriously) and hotter than hot! I have no idea how Kelly talked me into this, since I HATE the heat, but we did it anyway. We soon saw people on campus with Dr. Pepper floats so we went in search of them. Baylor is famous for their Dr. Pepper floats which are pure deliciousness wrapped up with Dr. Pepper and vanilla ice cream. They give them out for free during the school year every week so we knew they had to be around somewhere. It turned out to be orientation weekend for incoming freshman, so we found a bunch of VERY young looking freshman with our Dr. Pepper floats. Hannah had a taste of her first one, and she obviously loved it!

We ended our walk by going back to Kelly's apartment and going swimming in the pool which felt fantastic after our walk. One funny story from that is worthy of sharing. Hannah was loving the pool and was "swimming" by the pool steps. She noticed the water flow and Kelly pointed out to her that what she was looking at was a jet. So, they talked about the jet for a few moments until Hannah moved on. About a minute later Hannah walked back over to the jet and told us that she was going to go sit on the airplane....I guess we need to learn about homophones next. :)

On Wednesday we met up with Kelly, Crystal, and Joe to see "UP" in the theatre. This was Hannah's first time seeing a full movie in the theatre. She actually did really well during the movie, which I was quite impressed about. She sat in her own seat for most of the movie and toward the end when she got a bit restless she sat with me. She held her own with our bucket of popcorn and loved the skittles that she was given. I was not overly impressed by the movie though. It was good, but it was not as kid friendly as I thought it would be. I will make sure that the next movie we take Hannah to is much more kid friendly.

We had a great few days hanging out with wonderful friends! Kelly took some cute pictures of Hannah in the movie, so I will share those when I get them.

Otherwise life is pretty darn good around here.

Randomness

Not much to report around here. I thought I would share 2 cute pictures of Hannah though. I promise I did not style her hair like this, but this is true bed head right here!!! We have seen the beginnings of Hannah sharing her imagination, which is really cool to watch. The other day while she was painting, she told me that her blob was an elephant. Then she proceeded to paint 2 more elephants and a dog. It was great for me to see her thinking and sharing all that is going on in that little brain of hers. I love these days!!!

Is it just me?

Or is our baby growing into a little girl?! When I snapped this picture today and looked at it, the first thing I thought was how incredibly grown up she looks! I really can't believe how quickly time is flying right now.
Hannah's verbal skills are growing exponentially every day which is amazing to listen to. She is doing wonderfully in her new bed and has yet to get out of bed at night or during naps...I am shocked to say the least. The funniest thing happened in relation to that yesterday. I heard her outside of her room saying "night night" to her baby doll. I peeked around the corner and she had laid her baby doll in her bed and as she was leaving the room and shutting the door, she turned and told the baby "no get out bed baby, no get out bed." At least I know that she hears what we say when we put her to bed. Too cute.
I am really soaking up these days with out little cutie. I love the new things she says and does each and every day. The Lord is good in providing such joy in these 2 year old days!

A successful switch!!!

Well, tonight was the night for the big switch to a big girl bed. Surprisingly it went incredibly well! Hannah has been excited about this for days now and we have been talking a lot about it with her. Tonight as we were setting the bed up in her room she was SO excited. She kept saying "Hannah big girl bed" and "Hannah sleep in big girl bed" over and over. It was really cute! Then when everything was set up, I laid down with her and told her that we do not get out of bed and that she will now be sleeping in this bed. She promptly said "ALL DONE" with a bit of fear and trembling in her voice. Jason laid down with her for about 5 minutes and rubbed her back and then left the room. I was SURE she would get out multiple times tonight and that we would have to explain things to her, reassure her, and put her back in her bed. So, we waited, and waited...nothing! I was so proud of her, but she did not make a peep and did not move a muscle. I do think she was a bit scared, but she certainly did not do what I expected her to do, which was to cry and get out of bed. Anyway, now, she is fast asleep in her big girl bed for the first time without a fuss or fight at all!!! And it is adorable!!!

Here she was before she realized that she actually had to sleep here.

I found this quilt online and I LOVE it! It goes perfectly with the colors of her room. We have also ordered a kit to change her crib into a full size head board and foot board, but it is backordered. Bummer! So, eventually it will have a headboard and footboard on it.

She realized that now her once unreachable picture is just within reach...lovely! Our sweet little thing fast asleep in her big girl bed! What a trooper!

Someone please remind me of how well she did tonight when I am dealing with her getting up and out of bed for the 17th time tomorrow and in the days to come!

What a blessing these sweet days are!

She's a deli sandwich kind of girl

We have found out that Hannah's second favorite food (behind chips and salsa) is a Subway deli sandwich. She LOVES to get her own little kid's meal sandwich and go to town on it. This worked really well when we drove to and from Alabama since Subway is always an easy place to stop and eat. It is so funny to me that a kid would love a deli sandwich so much, but she certainly does.

Just chillin and enjoying her sandwich.

2 more funny stories

We have 2 extremes around our house these days, either very happy or VERY unhappy. There is just not much middle ground these days for Hannah. In her very happy moments we have a pretty funny kid though. Here are 2 more funny stories from our little one.

1. We went to Walmart early in the morning a few days ago. We bought what we needed and as we were leaving I told Hannah that we were done at Walmart and heading home. She grabbed my hand, held it up, slapped me five, and said "good job Mommy!" I just love affirmation from a 2 year old...what a sweetie!

2. We were driving to our kids museum a few days ago and Hannah was getting really excited about going. She said "Mommy drive museum." I responded, "yes, Mommy is driving to the museum." She got really excited and shouted "GO, MOMMY, GO!" It was super cute!

In other news, we got Hannah a big girl bed on Wed. We are waiting on her bed frame to be delivered and then we will put it in her room. She is very excited. In fact, when we put her in her crib tonight, she cried because she wanted to sleep in her big girl bed (which is in the office right now).
Also, Hannah is intensly interested in the potty right now. She sits on is several times a day and mostly does nothing on it. However, she has gone at least once in the potty each of the last 4-5 days. I know that we still have a long road to go, and that is fine, but she is super intersted so we are certainly going with it for now.

Fun times around our household. And much grace and patience from God!

2 funny stories

In the midst of some difficult days in our household (teething two year old = unhappy toddler and Mommy!) we have had some funny stories. Let's hope we have more funny stories in the days to come and not so many unfunny stories!

1. Hannah darted down the driveway and into the street today. Yes, I realize that is not funny, in fact it was infuriating as I was hauling after her and yelling and she continued to run away! After I caught her and yanked her into the driveway (I am not going to sugercoat that...it was a yank!) she promptly pulled her pajama pants down to her ankles. Yes, she knew what was to come! I refrained from laughing in the moment but later it was a bit comical. I just hope her 7.6 seconds of running away from Mommy was worth the pop that her little thigh received. And, I certainly hope that she learned a lesson because it scared me half to death!!!

2. I was preparing to leave the house tonight and was changing clothes in our bedroom. Both Hannah and Molly were in the room with me. I told Hannah that we were getting ready to leave and when I finished changing and turned around, she had already corraled Molly into her crate and had closed the door. She certainly knows the patterns we have around the house and was dutifully putting Molly up for us to leave, even without me asking!

Someone please remind me of these funny moments when you see me next with tufts of my hair missing...i've been pulling them out one by one! Someone also please remind me that the grace of God is sufficient for me in these times. These days have a way of making me forget that.

Extreme swinging

Ever since Hannah has learned to ride "big girl" swings she has become an extreme swinger. She is not content with just leasurely swinging, she wants to go as high as she possibly can. Those of you how have been swinging with her lately have been exposed to the "higher please" plea that she gives over and over. Thankfully she has only fallen off twice and they were mild, but she is one extreme swing lover. Maybe I will finally get my extreme roller coaster riding partner in Hannah...since Jason is not great on them anymore (that's a story for another time though).

In other news, we are thick in the middle of teething. Hannah is cutting at least 2 of her second molers...and it stinks, royally! Her nose pours like a fountain, then the drainage causes late night coughing, she is contstantly chewing and biting her fingers, and she is generally grumpy...LOVELY!!!